Leviticus - 18:4



4 You shall do my ordinances, and you shall keep my statutes, and walk in them: I am Yahweh your God.

Verse In-Depth

Explanation and meaning of Leviticus 18:4.

Differing Translations

Compare verses for better understanding.
Ye shall do my judgments, and keep mine ordinances, to walk therein: I am the LORD your God.
Mine ordinances shall ye do, and my statutes shall ye keep, to walk therein: I am Jehovah your God.
You shall do my judgments, and shall observe my precepts, and shall walk in them. I am the Lord your God.
Mine ordinances shall ye do and my statutes shall ye observe to walk therein: I am Jehovah your God.
My judgments shall ye do, and my statutes shall ye keep, to walk therein: I am the LORD your God.
Ye shall perform my judgments, and keep my ordinances, to walk in them; I am the LORD your God.
My judgments ye do, and My statutes ye keep, to walk in them; I am Jehovah your God;
But you are to be guided by my decisions and keep my rules, and be guided by them: I am the Lord your God.
You shall accomplish my judgments, and you shall observe my precepts, and you shall walk in them. I am the Lord your God.
Judicia mea facite, et statuta mea observate, ut in ipsis ambuletis: ego Jehova Deus vester.

*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.


Historical Commentaries

Scholarly Analysis and Interpretation.

Ye shall therefore keep my statutes and my judgments. Because it is no less difficult to correct vices, to which men have been long accustomed, than to cure diseases of long standing, especially because people in general so pertinaciously cleave to bad examples, God adduces His statutes, in order to recall the people from the errors of their evil habits into the right way. For nothing is more absurd than for us to fix our minds on the actions of men, and not on God's word, in which is to be found the rule of a holy life. It is, therefore, just as if God would overthrow whatever had been received from long custom, and abolish the universal consent of the world by the authority of His doctrine. With this object He commands His Law to be regarded not once only, as we have already seen, lest the Israelites should abandon themselves to filthy lusts; but He diligently inculcates upon them, that they should turn away from all abuses, and keep themselves within the bounds and ordinances of His Law. And to this refers the expression, "I am the Lord your God;" containing a comparison between Himself and the heathen nations, between whom and His people He had interposed, as it were, a wall of partition.

Ye shall do my judgments,.... Which are just and right, and according to the rules of justice and equity; these are things, as Jarchi observes, which are said in the law with judgment, or are laws framed with the highest reason, even by the judgment of God himself, whose judgment is always according to truth: Aben Ezra thinks, these are the judicial laws in Exodus 21:1; but though they may include them, they have more particular respect to the following laws:
and keep mine ordinances, to walk therein: which he had ordained and appointed of his own will and pleasure, which Jarchi calls the decree of the king, or which he decreed and determined as a king, having absolute power over his subjects to enact and enjoin what he pleased; wherefore some think these refer to ceremonial laws, which depended upon the will of the lawgiver, and were not founded in any natural sense or reason, wherefore it follows:
I am the Lord your God: who had a right to make what laws he pleased, being their Sovereign, and which they in gratitude as well as in justice ought to obey, he being their God, their covenant God, who had done great and good things for them.

My judgments - Though you do not see the particular reason of some of them, and though they be contrary to the laws and usages of the other nations.

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